Blood
by Connie Nervegas
Summary: Songfic. Don contemplates the meaning of the red stuff.


_Yeah, I don't know where this came from. I've never done first aid, so I don't know if my description is accurate. But whatever._

_Song is "Comfortably Numb" by Pink Floyd._

Donatello pulled the thread threw his arm, gritting his teeth at the pain. He had been stitching up his own wounds since he was eleven years old. He didn't mind. It was his blood. Why should he be afraid? Mikey had offered to do it for him, but he would rather just sit in the quiet of the lab by himself. It was easier this way.

Blood. What a harmless substance in and of itself, he thought, as he dabbed a few drops away with a strip of gauze.

**Hello**

**Is there anybody in there?****  
****Just nod if you can hear me.****  
****Is there anyone home?**

When Donatello was a child he hated the sight of blood. No, didn't hate. The very idea of blood terrified him. It belonged on the inside of a body and if he could see, then somebody was broken.

Now, Donatello only knew his father and three brothers. If he saw blood, then he knew that it belonged to one of them.

The first time that he remembered seeing blood was when his Sensei stepped on a piece of glass while they were walking through the sewer tunnels. Sensei crept along silently while they all followed, keeping in the shadows under the grates and watching how he moved, imitating him. It made them all feel terribly grown up.

Then he heard a sharp intake of breath from Master Splinter. He sat down and crossed one of his legs over his knee to see the bottom of his foot. "Leonardo," he said, gesturing to him.

All four of them pressed around their father to see what was happening. The bottom of Sensei's paw was blackened from heavy use, but there was a small piece of clear glass stuck in his heel and a speck of bright red dripping from the wound.

"Blood is pretty," Mikey said, pointing. "Ain't it Raphie?"

Raph shrugged. "It's red."

_**Come on, now.**__**  
**__**I hear you're feeling down.**__**  
**__**Well I can ease your pain,**__**  
**__**Get you on your feet again.**_

As a teenager he didn't recall the actual process of passing out. But he was assured on several occasions by all three of his brothers that he swayed in one place and then toppled over onto his face.

He woke up in bed at home. Their bed was nothing more than a mattress on the floor and all four of the brothers slept together, with feet poking out in different directions. He remembered spending several days with four pairs of worried eyes following him wherever he went.

**Relax.****  
****I need some information first.****  
****Just the basic facts:****  
****Can you show me where it hurts?**

There was no time to get Raph back to the safety of the lab. Don wished that just once he could repair a wound in a sanitary room with pain medication and sterile tools. His lab was primitive and the infirmary equipment was really old medical supplies that they had found thrown out behind the hospital, but anything was better than this. A cold rooftop in the middle of the night

"Lift his arm," he said to Mikey, in a quavering voice. His voice always broke when he had to see these things. Don's breath was visible in the cold night air.

Mikey lifted Raph's immobile arm into the air and blood gushed from the open wound. Raph was still awake; his eyes swimming in his head.

"Leo," Don said, his hands now shaking. "Take off your belt and tie it up around his shoulder as tight as you can. Mikey, slap him to keep him awake if you have to."

He knew that these orders weren't really necessary. They all knew how this worked.

**There is no pain, you are receding.****  
****A distant ship's smoke on the horizon.****  
****You are only coming through in waves.****  
****Your lips move but I can't hear what you're sayin'.****  
****When I was a child I had a fever.****  
****My hands felt just like two balloons.****  
****Now I got that feeling once again.****  
****I can't explain, you would not understand.****  
****This is not how I am.****  
****I have become comfortably numb.**

His eyesight was already blurring and he was feeling warm. He just wanted to lie down and be close to the ground. But he reached for the sewing kit that he kept on his belt. He'd learned long ago that most wounds couldn't wait until they were in the safety of the infirmary.

Don threaded the needle with shaking hands. He managed it. He just needed to get the wound closed. It didn't matter if it was straight. He could fix it later.

How much of their blood covered the city, he wondered. They had bled all over the place. He made sure not to look into Raph's face as he set to work.

Don looked into the messy wound, covered in blood that gushed out at him with the pulse of his brother's heart. A true symbol of life, he thought, as he gathered the hot green skin together in hands and jabbed the needle in.

And he pulled out the thread, ignoring the flesh and muscle and possible hint of bone. The yellow fat layer under the skin. It all belonged inside. It was Raph's and it felt wrong of him to see it.

**Ok.****  
****Just a little pinprick. [ping]****  
****There'll be no more -aaaaaahhhhh!****  
****But you may feel a little sick.**

"Okay, let's get him home," Mikey said as soon as Don had successfully closed the wound.

Leo put his hands under Raph's arms and hoisted him up.

Don sat on the rooftop and took a brief look around the frozen city. Then he looked down at the blood that covered his hands and slumped to the ground.

**Can you stand up?****  
****I do believe it's working. Good.****  
****That'll keep you going for the show.****  
****Come on it's time to go.**

Don longed for the days when his brothers gave him looks of pity. Not scathing speeches about how he endangered their safety every time he decided to "faint" at the sight of blood. Leo was always sure to say the word faint. He knew it made him sound like a little girl.

Raph was lying on the infirmary bed while Don checked his stitching. He had done an unusually bad job and Mikey had tactfully done it over again without informing him.

"So did you pass out again?" Raph asked as he did some tentative exercises with his wounded arm to test its mobility.

"Don't even start. I know I'm a big coward." He remembered his stomach boiling with nausea as he looked into his brother's open flesh and felt tears of shame.

"Hey," Raph said. "You stitch us up every time even though you're about to hurl on us. I say that's real brave."

Raph always did have a twisted view of courage, Don thought.

**There is no pain, you are receding.****  
****A distant ship's smoke on the horizon.****  
****You are only coming through in waves.****  
****Your lips move but I can't hear what you're sayin'.****  
****When I was a child I caught a fleeting glimpse,****  
****Out of the corner of my eye.****  
****I turned to look but it was gone.****  
****I cannot put my finger on it now.****  
****The child is grown, the dream is gone.****  
****I have become comfortably numb.**

Don smiled to himself as he pulled a shard of glass out of the bottom of his foot and watched the pretty red stuff drip out of the gash. It didn't bother him in the least. But Mikey was right; it was pretty.

He owned his own blood. There was nothing to worry about. No fear of the loss of another. And he would never let go of his fear, no matter how much Leo ordered him to change. His brothers' blood was too precious not to fear.


End file.
